Ed Rall: The good man across the field in black & gold

Photo from Danville Advocate Messenger

If Kirk Clarke likes him, you know he has to be a great guy!  Ed Rall and Kirk were both students at Centre back in the early 70s.  Ed had played football at Frankfort HS for legendary coach, Ollie Leathers.  My dad hired Ed to be an assistant coach at Boyle County HS in 1972.  Coach Rall replaced my dad as the head football coach at Boyle in 1974.  He was the football and baseball coach there until 1987.   It has taken a long time for me to come to terms with some of the things that happened when my dad was at Boyle and how it ended. But, without a doubt, Ed Rall is a very good man and an outstanding football coach.

 

In the 70s and into the 80s, Coach Rall’s teams were very good, and some times borderline great.  On our schedule at Mercer, our toughest opponents were always the Rebels and the Harrodsburg Pioneers (Hogs). 

Our level of success here at Mason has become very similar to where the Boyle program was during that time period.  Not everyone had a program of Boyle’s caliber in that day, and you could say the same of ours today. 

 

Coach Rall ran a 3-back belly offense with the Rebels. They did a great job of hiding the football. More than once, the ball was blown dead and the Rebel QB would be running down the field with the ball during those years.  In 1982 as a defensive end, it was my job to tackle their QB, Andy Baker, every time they ran the belly, whether I thought he had the ball or not.  Before Andy, the Rebel QBs had been Russ Wolfe and CT Wolfe. Andy, Russ, and CT all ran Coach Rall’s offense to near perfection.  And, just when you thought you had it stopped, Coach Rall would take the playside halfback and run him straight down the middle of the field to catch a pass. Usually he was wide open.   As a coach, any time we play a three back offense, especially one that runs the belly, we are going to at least walk thru that play and talk about it, even if our opponent has never run it. 

 

On a side note, the Wolfe brothers went to my church in Danville, Centenary United Methodist.  Our church should have been named QB Methodist. The McAfee brothers from Danville, Mike Floro (Danville), Paul Morse (Danville) and Brad Dunn (Boyle) all went to our church.  I would bet there are more that I have left out.  I was the worst of the bunch but that’s ok because those guys could all play!

 

Coach Rall did a great job of using his personnel. He always seemed to have a bunch of running backs. Running a 3-back offense played to their strengths.  When he had Tommy Pettit at tight end, he adjusted their offense to take advantage of his talents. On defense, his 6-2 allowed him to absorb the offensive front with his defensive linemen so the two stud inside linebackers could make the plays. He had a lot of kids out for football and he was good at finding a way to use them to help the team win.

 

Ed Rall is also a tough guy. Not tough as in mean, but extremely tough as in durable. He was the coach at Boyle for 14 years, across town from the Danville Admirals and the Rebel football fans have high expectations every year.  Much of that goes back to the undefeated Perryville football 8-man teams in the 50s before the smaller county schools consolidated into one school. Coach Roy Walton of Tates Creek used to say, “A new broom sweeps clean.”  In other words, it is tough to stay in one place and be successful for an extended time.  Ed Rall did it.

 

In 1982 we were going to play Coach Rall’s Rebels at our place.  For me, it was surreal because we were playing on September 24^th. On the 24th in 1970 at Mercer, Robert Allen Yankey had played his last game as the Rebel QB for my dad.  Robert Allen died on the 25^th in an accident on their family farm when I was 5.  Now, I was going to be the Mercer QB on the 24^th, at Mercer, playing the Rebels. The circumstances were overwhelming for me.

 

I knew going into the game they were much better. I remember telling my dad on the way home from church the Sunday before, if we can generate 300 yards in the air, we can have a shot at them.  On Friday night, when I got to the sideline to be a captain and I saw those gold helmets on that opposite sideline, where I had been before with my dad, it was an experience/emotion I can’t put into words.

 

We played hard and played as well as we could play.  We made it 7-6 early in the game and in the 3^rd quarter pulled to within 2 TDs. I remember being so tired that I went out to line up for kick off return after we scored. Someone had to tell me we were kicking off. We didn’t win or have 300 yards passing.  When the game was over, I went to see my dad and was very disappointed. Coach Rall, first class as always, found both of us and said, “John, I think he threw for 300 yards.” 

 

I’ve noticed as I get older, the good memories and people get bigger. The negatives get smaller. At the age of 48, my memories of Boyle, Mercer, Paris, and Mason are overwhelmingly positive. Ed Rall is one of the good guys. He gets bigger everyday and I am glad he led the team in gold helmets so well for so many years.  And, he is Kirk Clarke’s 2^nd favorite football coach. Of course, Kirk’s son-in-law Chris Ullery is number 1!